Friday Round Up: News for the Week Ending 8/26/16

I have no idea how to classify this. It’s a video that came out this week. Supposedly an interview with an alien from Area 51. I mean, it’s fake but it’s clever and intense and creepy. I love it. Had to share.

Okay, this week we have plenty of genre movie news, TV trailers and some fascinating stuff about virtual reality. I think you’ll like it.

MOVIES

I loved this news that broke recently. The Marvel movies always have a little time at the end of their shoot for some reshoots. This is scheduled for them to get pickup shots they realize could help the movie flow better or to punch up something to work on tone. Maybe it needs more jokes or action or exposition, for instance. Well apparently Marvel hired Dan Harmon to come out and write for the Dr. Strange reshoots. Wow. While he’s best known for creating Community and co-creating Rick and Morty and therefore is best known for his comedy, he’s also a big proponent of story structure and the hero’s quest monomyth as defined by Joseph Campbell. He may seem like an out there choice but so did guys like Jon Favreau, James Gunn and Joss Whedon at one time. Also, the Russo brothers who directed the last two Captain America movies and will direct the next two Avengers movies, did a lot of work directing on Community. That’s why each of their Marvel movies includes a cameo by a cast member from that sitcom. I can’t wait to see the movie and try to pick out Dan’s contributions. I’m a big, big fan. Writing this, I realize I never got to do a trailer breakdown for the 2nd Dr. Strange trailer since I was traveling abroad when it was released. Darn.

New Mutants is apparently moving forward. The Hollywood Reporter revealed that it has writers and a director. The writers explained who would be on their team: “Native American Danielle Moonstar, Scots girl Wolfsbane, Brazilian ladies man Sunspot, a Kentuckian code-named Cannonball, and Russian teen Magik. Also in the mix will be an alien named Warlock.” So that is the majority of the original team. There were also two girls that were in the original lineup: Magma and Karma. But both left fairly early on. But one major member they didn’t list was Cypher. He could read any language so he was a computer expert and could talk to people in other countries or aliens. He was with the team for a long time but not the most useful in a fight and he died on a mission. I always thought he had a power I’d love to have but I guess he just wouldn’t fit in an action movie.

In related news, director/producer Bryan Singer says the TV show Legion will somehow be connected to the X-Men movies. I mean, good luck with that. Fox doesn’t seem to plan things forward like Marvel Studios does and even then the connections pretty much flow one way: from the movies to references on their TV shows. I find it hard to believe they’ll say that the main character from Legion is Professor X’s son.

Oh, and Doug Liman ditched the Gambit movie that really doesn’t seem likely to get made. Instead he’s gonna direct Justice League Dark for DC, about the supernatural heroes like Deadman and Constantine teaming up. Fox has as many fails as hits with its X-Men stuff.

The current rumor is that Transformers: The Last Knight does not refer to Rom: Spaceknight and the fifth movie won’t do anything to set up a Hasbro Cinematic Universe. Instead, it supposedly relates to an item of power that existed back with Merlin and Arthur that Optimus Prime is seeking to repower Cybertron. Don’t be surprised if some of that changes, but the main takeaway is this will be a standalone movie.

TV

The CW released a teaser for Arrow season 5. We can see glimpses of Mr. Terrific, Wild Dog and probably Prometheus. Other characters that will be a recurring part of this season will be Artemis, Vigilante and Ragman. I’m pretty excited for this season. Dolph Lundgren will play a Russian leader of the Bratva in the flashbacks this season that explain how Oliver Queen became a captain in their mafia. And Prometheus is a great villain, a reverse of Batman or Green Arrow. His parents were criminals that were killed by the police in the comics and he trained himself to be the ultimate criminal in revenge. On the show, he’ll probably be the son of one of the criminals Oliver killed back in season one.

The Flash also got a teaser. It doesn’t reveal quite as much but we catch a glimpse of Savitar. In the comics he was a speedster that had a cult and he was connected to the Speed Force on a near religious level. If he could find a way to poison the source of super speed, I won’t be surprised to see Flash’s former villains from seasons one and two potentially team up with him at some point. There will also be a two-parter to Gorilla City this season, a crossover musical with Supergirl and a four-way crossover with Arrow, Legends of Tomorrow and Supergirl. Oh, also an arc based on Flashpoint and evil speedster The Rival and Wally West as Kid Flash. Pretty ambitious stuff.

Spider-Gwen will debut in animated form next month! She’s a fantastic character co-created by Jason Latour and artist Robbi Rodriguez. Really great addition to Marvel. Well, she will appear on Disney XD’s Ultimate Spider-Man vs. The Sinister 6. Dove Cameron will voice the character, and Gwen will appear in the September 17 episode that’s part four of the “Return to the Spider-Verse” story.

GAMES

Justin Roiland isn’t just the co-creator/voices of Rick and Morty. He also loves videogames. He’s been big into virtual reality. He’s formed a company to develop VR games called Squanchtendo, which he explains in the comic above. They’re actually hiring right now.

MUSIC

Finally, I leave you with this recent video by The Cypertronic Spree, a band that dresses up as various characters from Transformers and sings songs from Transformers: The Movie (and sometimes other geek pop like Ghostbusters or the Droids theme song). They tour a bit, mostly in Canada. Check out their site and dates here.